WASHINGTON – The full Senate Appropriations Committee has approved the Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies FY09 Appropriations Bill which includes $400,000 for the Greater Hudson Valley Family Health Center in Newburgh.

The funding would be used to construct a Federally Qualified Health Center, increasing the healthcare for medically underserved populations in medically underserved areas, and will establish up to 50 new jobs in Newburgh.

The Family Health Center, now based at Washington Square in the City of Newburgh, has plans to build its own new primary healthcare facilities to serve the medically underserved population of the region.

The Family Center plans to build a $15 million facility on a six acre parcel on Lake Street in the City of Newburgh, said President Linda Muller.

“This appropriation certainly will help us get even close to putting our shelter in the ground and realizing our dream of a beautiful primary care facility here on our end of the county,” she said.

Muller said she would hope to break ground for the new facility later this summer.

She credited Senator Charles Schumer and Congressman Maurice Hinchey with moving the $400,000 grant appropriation through their respective houses of Congress.